


Something Next to Normal

by ElphabaInTheTARDIS



Category: Edgar Allan Poe's Murder Mystery Dinner Party (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Post-Series, jumbled headcannons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-05
Updated: 2016-12-05
Packaged: 2018-09-06 19:16:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8765653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElphabaInTheTARDIS/pseuds/ElphabaInTheTARDIS
Summary: "I don't need a life that's normal. That's way too far away. But something next to normal would be okay." --Next to NormalThings in Edgar Allan Poe’s house didn’t go back to normal after everything that had happened. But how could they? Their normal had been thrown out the window the minute people started actually dying.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Small little inter-connected headcannon-like things I came up with. If I'm feeling super motivated I might expand on a few of them and turn them into actual stories.

Things in Edgar Allan Poe’s house didn’t go back to normal after everything that had happened.

Some nights Edgar still heard the beating of the heart underneath the floorboards. Sometimes Annabel would find him in the study staring at the floor with an almost crazy expression on his face, and she would have to say his name several times before he looked at her, and she would coax him back up to bed.

Some nights Annabel would awaken and gasp for air, nightmares of her death still grasping at her. The first time it happened, Edgar was particularly useless and unable to calm Annabel’s crying and he finally went in search of Lenore, who was able to calm her down and finally remind her that “you’re a ghost, Anna Banana. You like, don’t have to breathe. Ever.” Through her sniffles Annabel could only whisper “but it seemed so real.”

Lenore wondered if she should also tell Annabel that she didn’t need to sleep either.

Some nights H.G. would awaken from his own nightmares, struggling to breathe, feeling the smoke in the attic closing in around him like it once had. Lenore is gentler in reminding him that he’s okay and that he’s a ghost and doesn’t need to breathe. She holds him close as he calms down, and she plays with his hair gently until he dozes back off. She’ll never admit that to anyone though. Because that would be like, totally lame, right?

Lenore has her own version of nightmares. She had learned years ago that she didn’t need sleep, but that didn’t stop the times where her mind got so exhausted that she zoned out only to be shaken by the memory of pain as she died, or the pain she felt as H.G. had died in her arms.

She’s gotten very good at hiding her pain…but she soon realizes that those are the days that Annabel leaves a bottle of her favorite wine at the bottom of the stairs leading to the attic and those are the days where H.G. stops his tinkering and simply sits with her while she totally doesn’t cry. Sometimes he holds her like she holds him, and even though she knows she doesn’t _have_ to breathe, she does just so she can take in the scent of him. It calms her. And it’s totally NOT lame or anything like that.

Sometimes the four of them sit down for dinner together. Never in the dining room, though. Maybe someday they’ll be able to sit in there and not be reminded of Eddie. Today is not that day.

There are days where Edgar forgets that Annabel is here and that she’s finally chosen him. He’ll be writing furiously in his study only to be stopped by the sound of her approach, sometimes with baked goods (because someone in this house needs to eat), sometimes to ask him to go on a walk with her. Sometimes she’ll sit and watch him write, enthralled by how intently he works.

He used to mind when people (Lenore) would sit and watch him work. He finds that he welcomes it when the person is Annabel.

H.G. slowly takes over the house with all of his inventions. Bundles of wires and electronic parts can be found in almost any corner until Edgar’s ravens become tangled in one, and then all inventions are banished to the attic. Lenore may or may not leave a few on Edgar’s desk every few days or so just to annoy him.

Annabel still can’t quite catch on to becoming corporeal. She gets it half the time, but the times she doesn’t get it mostly involve her spilling whatever item she’s brought up to Edgar. After the tenth cup of hot tea spilled, he learns to quickly grab anything she’s bringing him so it doesn’t ruin another manuscript.

H.G. on the other hand, managed to master that concept by day three and surprises Lenore shyly with a rose he had found outside. She blushes as much as a ghost can when he hands it to her and if anyone asked her she totally didn’t put it in a vase in her attic and she was definitely not sad when it finally began to die. And she definitely didn’t find it sweet that when he realized she was sad about it dying, H.G. made it his mission to always find a new flower for her vase.

Annabel brings Edgar food (when she doesn’t spill it everywhere that is) and reminds him gently to take care of himself, since after all, he has to keep living for all of them. He always grumbles that he knows how to take care of himself, but always accepts and eats anything Annabel brings him. She’s content to just sit with him and enjoy the time they now have.

Lenore and H.G. working on his inventions in the attic…well…H.G. works on inventions. Lenore mostly watches and offers commentary and sarcastic remarks, which he takes in stride after realizing that she was flirting with him and not insulting him. Eventually he learns how to tease her back, and she rolls her eyes but he catches the smile on her face after she thinks he’s not paying attention. Sometimes she’ll sit right next to him while he works. It’s not her fault if he then gets distracted. Nope. Not her fault at all.

(And she doesn’t mind the distraction so long as she’s the distraction. It’s different when they’re making out like teenagers and he gets an idea for an invention and gets distracted and eventually runs off. If he wasn’t so adorable about it, she’d be angry.)

Annabel and Edgar go on walks every day. Lenore rolls her eyes and makes snide remarks about him finally getting out of the house, but secretly she’s pleased that her roomie and her bestie are finally together.

Slowly as the days move on, this becomes their new normal. Their new beginning where the world isn’t as cruel to them and the four of them realize that this small family they have created can be their new happiness.


End file.
